


We Are Owed No Angels

by DangersUntoldHardshipsUnnumbered



Series: Many Little AUs for the Purpose of Exploding the Lilshotgun Tag [3]
Category: Warrior Nun (TV)
Genre: AU, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-01
Updated: 2020-09-01
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:53:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26238175
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DangersUntoldHardshipsUnnumbered/pseuds/DangersUntoldHardshipsUnnumbered
Summary: Mary is James Dean, basically, and crashes Lilith's wedding to a man she doesn't love."Her groom is a fine specimen, handsome enough, wealthy enough, an upstanding member of the Church. He is everything Lilith is supposed to want.But all she can think of is Mary. Mary in her black leather jacket, cigarette in hand, shirt unbuttoned about three too many. Mary, with grease on her hands, fixing her motorcycle. Mary, making love to her in a field, on a blanket under the stars."
Relationships: Sister Lilith/Shotgun Mary (Warrior Nun)
Series: Many Little AUs for the Purpose of Exploding the Lilshotgun Tag [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1905607
Comments: 12
Kudos: 34





	We Are Owed No Angels

Lilith stands at the altar, the pipe organ fading away. The priest’s voice drones away as he delivers the homily that comes along with this, her wedding ceremony. Her dress is beautiful, studded with pearls and voluminous, cinched at the waist. She knows she has never looked prettier in her life.

Except, she felt a hundred times more beautiful in a pair of old, soft jeans, hair up in a messy ponytail, because Mary was looking at her like she was an angel.

She pushes the thought from her mind. She is marrying. Her parents expected this of her. They made themselves quite clear. Her groom is a fine specimen, handsome enough, wealthy enough, an upstanding member of the Church. He is everything Lilith is supposed to want.

But all she can think of is Mary. Mary in her black leather jacket, cigarette in hand, shirt unbuttoned about three too many. Mary, with grease on her hands, fixing her motorcycle. Mary, making love to her in a field, on a blanket under the stars.

She barely hears the priest talking:

“Love consists of this: it is not we who loved God, but God loved us and sent his Son to expiate our sins. My dear friends, if God loved us so much, we too should love one another. No one has ever seen God, but as long as we love one another God remains in us and his love comes to its perfection in us. This is the proof that we remain in him and he in us, that he has given us a share in his Spirit.”

Lilith does not feel the presence of God, she reflects. She doesn’t love this man. She likes him well enough, she supposes. She’ll have to get by with that.

In the distant periphery of her hearing, for a moment she’s almost sure she hears a motorcycle roaring outside. But that can’t be. Nobody would be coming to her wedding on a motorcycle.

“Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you. This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I have loved you.”

She’s not going to cry at her own wedding, she decides. She smiles weakly at him. Adam will probably be a fine husband. He’s no-one’s villain. She feels badly for him, marrying a girl whose heart belongs to someone else, someone so very different. Adam went to Yale and wears house slippers. He wants children who will also be legacies at Yale and go into the family business.

The priest says, “Adam and Lilith, as you dedicate yourselves to one another, we are mindful of the presence of God around us.” Adam takes her hand. His nephew the ring bearer is standing ready at his side.

Smiling at her, he says, “I, Adam, take you, Lilith, to be my wife, for better or worse, sickness and health, in plenty and want, to stand together in our times of joy and sorrow, always to be faithful to you. I will love you and honor you all the days of my life.”

Lilith’s heart sinks. She smiles nervously.

As he’s about to slide the ring on, a dramatic thud sounds from the back of the sanctuary. The large, heavy wooden door has been flung open.In it, panting a little, looking like a woman genuinely on fire, is Mary, in a tux.

Everyone turns around and a murmur of confusion fills the room.

“Can we help you?” the priest asks.

“Yeah,” Mary says. “Have you gotten to the speak now or forever hold your peace part?”

The priest clears his throat. “Er, no, but… You know you’re not actually supposed to speak at that point.”

Mary’s eyes are smoldering coals as she marches up to the front of the room, stands at the foot of the altar, looking up.

“I just have one thing to say,” she says, “and then I promise I’ll leave, no matter what.”

Adam clears his throat. “Lily, do you know this woman?”

Lilith puts a hand up. Her heart is racing. What is Mary doing? She knows that Lilith has to do this, that she doesn’t have a choice, that she has to be who her parents expect her to be. “Yes, I … I know her.Please, it’s alright, I’ll just–”

“You listen,” Mary says. “I’ll be quick.”

Sweat breaks on Lilith’s skin. Mary starts speaking, in that sweet, rhythmic way she would do when she was reading her Kerouac in flatbed of her pickup truck. Lilith doesn’t know what to do because it summons every memory of passion to her skin in a desperate flush.

“If God’s a blacksmith,

I am the result of heat and hammering

Made for nothing

Except to fit you, and only you

If God’s a carpenter

I’m the leftover piece of a split off end

Brokedown piece of wood too flawed

To fit anyplace but at your side,

In your hands

You come in like blazing heat,

like the edge of a chisel

And I’m cleaved

I’m grieved

I have receivedyour love and it is too much

And never, never enough

And I am owed no angels, but in my hand

Are these feathers you left in my bed

And I can’t help thinking you left them behind

For me to find

And when I stroke them they’re as soft as silk

And still not softer than your skin

I have seen you

In agony, in ecstasy above me—

When you loved me,

I’d spread God across your skin and

You’d paint divine memories on the cieling of my mind.

Together we made a cathedral and

Baby I have no heart to burn it down.

I know your wounds,

Your ruins,

The place where pain and pleasure meet

And I have worshipped there a hundred times

And would worship there a thousand more.

You are more than Adam’s equal.

You’re my sister, my lover,

We’re the originals, we don’t need a sequel.

You don’t need to bow your head,

Take up space in his bed,

Shrink yourself to be a wife

When you could be my queen instead.

And every time our bodies collided,

We changed each other’s shape,

And there is nobody else who fits me now.

And for you it’s the same.

I know your pain, and shame

And the nerves on your body that

Love my mouth and make you cry my name.

Leave the garden, you were meant to leave the frame.

Wrap yourself around me.

Let’s sing the refrain.

We are owed no angels

But we can seize them all the same.”

The sanctuary goes silent. Mary looks at Lilith for a long moment, then turns around, walks back down the aisle, and out the door.

Lilith stares after her.

“Lily?” Adam says quietly. “Is there somethingyou want to tell me?”

“Yes,” she says after a moment. “I’m sorry.”

A gasp runs through the room as she gathers up her dress and runs down the steps of the altar and down the aisle. Mary is on her motorcycle, outside, and looks up at her with relief in her eyes.

“You knew I would come,” Lilith accuses.

“I hoped.”

“You realize what you’ve done.”

“Yeah. Do you care?”

“Maybe a little.” She glances around, her breath shallow and her heart racing. Then she hikes her dress up a little more, climbs on behind Mary and breathes deep, wraps her arms around Mary’s waist. “I don’t regret it though.”

The bike rumbles underneath her. She knows there will be hell to pay for this choice, but right now, she wants nothing more than to find a dim little motel room and a bottle of wine, and spend a few hours seizing those angels.


End file.
